


The trick of finding what you didn't lose

by eak_a_mouse



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Post Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-03
Updated: 2012-06-03
Packaged: 2017-11-06 18:49:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/422002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eak_a_mouse/pseuds/eak_a_mouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first plan involved fewer bodies. </p>
<p>The second plan was complicated. (Of course there was a second plan. There was also a third plan. Labeled Mycroft, in case Moriarty had an armed force. The fourth plan involved nuclear materials.) </p>
<p>The second plan has Sherlock traipsing around the world. And apparently hallucinating.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The trick of finding what you didn't lose

The first plan involved fewer bodies.

The existence of Richard Brook, Storyteller could be debunked with time, a decent Internet connection, and, at worst, a humiliating call to Mycroft. 

The hostages were unfortunate, but not unexpected given Moriarty’s past history with bombs. They could be dealt with as well, although Sherlock was forced to recognize and ignore the discomfort of John in a sniper’s sight, again. It brought a whiff of chlorine to mind. 

After all, so long as Moriarty was playing, the game was still on. Sherlock was an old hat at a bit of misdirection here, some manipulation there. Just because he felt no need to create a replica of Mycroft’s web of intrigue certainly did not mean he was incapable. 

With Moriarty’s death, (The noise of gunfire, the fresh spatter pattern, both more visceral than a crime scene. Sherlock’s mind kept ticking. What an odd strategy, to sacrifice the most powerful piece for the hope of checkmate without any secondary plan. He’d expected an insane man to follow logic, as fallible as societal norms. Never the less.) he defaulted to the second plan.  
___

The second plan was complicated. (Of course there was a second plan. There was also a third plan. Labeled Mycroft, in case Moriarty had an armed force. The fourth plan involved nuclear materials.) 

Intellectually, he knew, as he braced himself on the roof’s edge against the wind ruffling his coat, the second plan meant abandoning his friend (friends?) and his… home. (He rolled the word around a bit in his mind. 221B had become more than a place store experiments. It was all tied up with tea, the sound of John pecking at his keyboard and Mrs. Hudson’s cooking.) Regardless of his dislike of psychology as a profession and psychologists in general (Honestly, a blog?), he was prepared for his body to betray him with the results of separation. At the moment, however, he was a bit occupied with impressing upon John the absolute futility of searching for him and getting himself in the way of more snipers. (Snipers. What was it with John and snipers?) The tears were simply necessary for the performance. Then there was a rush to properly direct the crowd and double-check his calculation of viewpoints, before altering his appearance and moving to rendezvous with Molly and get back to the morgue.

The ride back to the morgue was silent. Sherlock found himself peering out of fogged windows hoping for one last glimpse. The heat in her car wasn’t working properly on his side and he shifted to avoid a spring pushing into his back. The radio remained off. Sherlock bowed his head and wished for sleep. The room itself was empty and echoing when they arrived, it seemed to darkly reflect each soft footstep and shift of weight. Sherlock promptly left Molly arranging his autopsy to clean up a bit in the bathroom and borrow some supplies from the evidence lockup. 

With a quick alteration of records, the gun and clothing he appropriated would be tracked to an error in Anderson’s reports. Sherlock could easily imagine that quirk of the lips that John would have tried to suppress had he been there. He returned to placate Molly, prepared for tearful goodbyes. (John had impressed upon him the importance of pandering to others’ emotional displays. John was simply better at it. On the other hand, not everyone would have been able to arrange a body in a day and half. Molly was worth the effort and she… deserved a goodbye.) She was, surprisingly, dry-eyed and sober and a bit nervous…ah, a question, Sherlock thought while moving to use the morgue’s computer. 

“Are you…” Here she paused to catch his eye. More firmly, she continued, “Are you sure you don’t want to tell John?”

Sherlock stilled, blinked, and replied firmly. “No.”

With a last swirl of the coat he would have to lose soon, he swept from the morgue and out into the night.  
___

His remaining time in London was spent organizing funds, creating and resurrecting a few aliases, arranging transportation, and avoiding Mycroft amidst sweeping up the trailing ends of Moriarty’s London network. Lestrade, Mrs. Hudson, and John would be reasonably safe from retaliation, while he was…occupied elsewhere. If he happened to peek into Bart’s occasionally, well, he was thorough.

His last day was a month after the closed casket funeral. With an eye to checking on the occupants of 221 Baker Street, he went to the quiet funereal plot and found a place to sit in the shade and enjoy a cigarette. He something like fondness for the two of them, coming to visit his grave every week like clockwork. He himself didn’t understand the point of visiting when he, or at least the empty casket in his place, would never appreciate the effort. 

Sentiment. He rolled his eyes briefly. 

They were rather aesthetically pleasing, the army doctor and the not-housekeeper, with their not-quite-blond hair contrasting nicely with their dark clothing, the brightness of the sky and the surrounding land. John had changed. The cane was obvious, return of the psychosomatic limp, and his shoulder showed tension that was likely the result of lack of exercise. Sherlock frowned. While their adventures had the advantage of forcing consistent exertion, he had expected that John would have replaced them with physical therapy. Hands revealed more hours at the clinic, his figure had lost several pounds, and Sherlock suspected what food he was eating was provided by Mrs. Hudson. 

Then, alone, he started to speak.

Sherlock froze. Hearing his voice was pleasant enough, but there was quaver hiding in his attempts to remain stoic...Sherlock inhaled a new cloud of smoke and idly wished for something stronger. He was unsure if it was wise to remain. 

“…Just stop it. Stop this.” John trailed off and rested his hand on top of the tombstone Mycroft had so thoughtfully had engraved.

Sherlock reminded himself why, exactly, he could not “stop this” until he’d rolled up Moriarty’s network. 

It did nothing to stop the tension in his body as he tried very hard not to ruin the key element to the safety of London. For the safety of John and Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade, he had to stay dead. It was why, grudgingly, his brother had only watched by CCTV and studiously avoided direct contact.

As John made his painstakingly slow way to the car, Sherlock stubbed out his cigarette, breathed out one long, slow exhale, and kept his eyes on his retreating back. This was the hurt he’d thought he’d feel standing on the ledge of a very tall building a month ago. The textbooks he’d memorized in childhood did not properly describe the sensation, like his very organs were in the midst of a rebellion and his heart seemed to be trying to leap out of his throat. He swallowed roughly and found himself unconsciously rubbing his chest to ease the ache. One more shaky breath of smoke and he flicked the cigarette away.

There was work to be done and he was on the clock. What was that saying? Something… soonest mended. He would return when he was finished.

With a less elegant swirl, of the new and unimpressive coat, (Sherlock imagined John saying, “At least it stops you looking all mysterious.” He’d laugh a little afterwards, when Sherlock flipped the collar up anyway.) he left the graveyard to its own devices.  
___

The next year was the most brilliant game that Sherlock had ever played. His aliases, after all, were far worse thieves, con men (in one memorable instance, con woman), and burglars than he had ever been. He certainly did not miss dealing with the government’s bureaucracy on a regular basis, although he missed Lestrade’s access the few times he had to hack into police records. It was disconcerting, missing people, particularly when his footsteps were the only ones pounding down an alleyway and witnesses were surprisingly closed mouthed, even when it came to the most gossiped about local criminals. 

And then of course there was no praise forthcoming for his deductions, not even when he brought down a kidnapping ring by analyzing a pillowcase. That was amazing wasn’t nearly as enticing when he was the one thinking it. You miss him, his mind whispered and he ignored it. He couldn’t go back. 

It might have been why he started hallucinating Watsons. 

A staid, married doctor had John’s cool competence when he came stumbling across his threshold with a bullet wound. (Apparently, having a sharpshooter as your backup was different from having a gun yourself.) He had that look about him of someone inured to chaos and his wife, Mary, while utterly confused about a rather crazed man invading their home, was drafted easily enough as a surgical assistant. He gave his name was Dr. Watson and Sherlock chalked it up to hallucinations and pain medication. (Mycroft would have been appalled.) The fact that the good doctor was wounded in Afghanistan and only sometimes used a cane was a coincidence. Apparently, there were more Dr. Watson’s with past military service than he’d thought. He left for Spain as soon as possible. He was not running away. He was not.

The next one introduced himself as John Watson across the worn out felt of a back room poker game. A gambler with a fine mustache, he was wearing a top hat and suspenders and smoking a cigar. He acted astonishingly nonchalant for a man betting with the sort of criminals to whom no one would ever wish to be indebted. Then again, he was winning. He also apparently shared John’s habit of carrying a gun, his aim, and his willingness to shoot a drug dealer trying to kill Sherlock. Sherlock took in his military posture and the elegant cane left with his winnings. He sighed and accepted his offer of dinner and a place to stay for the night. Sherlock found it restful, even if that dog (Gladstone, was it?) snored like a chainsaw. The next day he was on a boat to Russia. 

After that, the Watsons were almost commonplace. Cropping up just as often as that elusive smell of Mrs. Hudson’s baking and the taste of tea in 221B Baker Street, and just as fleeting as his belief that he saw someone he knew (John, Lestrade, Molly, Mrs. Hudson, Harry, Sally, Sebastian, and, even once, Anderson’s ugly face) regardless of the fact that he was somewhere in Croatia at the time. James, Johns, Hamishs, and always, always Watsons popped in and out of his wanderings. 

The last was the translator ( all-around-assistant) he hired (blackmailed) into helping him navigate India. 

Her name was Joan Watson. 

Of course. 

Her long, dark hair, eyes and skin inherited from her parents who came from China and the flat American accent from the place of her birth separated her from John more than any other. But, as she followed him in two inch heels and a ridiculous skirt through the narrow streets of a slum, he couldn’t help but remember that first case together in London chasing the cab through construction sites and over rooftops. 

She was a fighter more than the rest. Watsons, apparently, whether soldiers, doctors, gamblers, or beekeepers “don’t take shit from anyone” as one Hamish had posited. She seemed to have dealt with more in her lifetime than her male compatriots. She, at the very least, was willing to kick the man who took the opportunity to feel her up at a crowded train station in the groin and then quietly threaten to completely emasculate his prone form should he ever breathe in her direction again. 

It only seemed natural that she ended it by pepper spraying one Sebastian Moran (dishonorably discharged, right hand man to Moriarty, expert sniper, likely to have been present at the pool, also likely to have been the sniper with sights on John) and flinging him off a roof. 

It was a rather ignominious end for the man Sherlock had chased around the world.

It was nearly poetic. 

It was done. 

\---

Sherlock was on the private jet Mycroft had sent to retrieve him thirty minutes later. 

They even shook hands upon arrival. Mycroft raised his eyebrow in mute distaste for the poor fit of his clothes, obviously meant for someone twenty pounds heavier. “How was your trip brother dear?”

“Mycroft.” Sherlock seemed mildly disgruntled, but unsurprised.

“I heard you met one of Moriarty’s colleagues.”

“He met his end on the asphalt beneath a building in India.” 

Mycroft presented his patented moue of distaste for the crass mention of murder. Sherlock snarled at having to do his brother’s dirty work. 

Returning to his task, Mycroft murmured, “Mummy will be expecting a visit.” 

“After. I have...affairs to arrange.” With that Sherlock moved to push past his brother, but was stopped by the tip of Mycroft’s umbrella in front of his shoe. 

“You will be presented with some sort of medal for your efforts.”

“Watching out for the family name, Mycroft?” 

With a sniff, Mycroft shifted the umbrella back to the floor in front of him and clasped the handle.

“The announcement will be tomorrow. It would be best to speak to your army doctor beforehand.”

Sherlock moved forward a step and then stopped at the sound of Mycroft’s voice. 

“And brother,” Here he reached to touch the very edge of Sherlock’s sleeve, “Welcome home.”  
__

The flat had been tidied, painfully so. The detritus of current projects had been replaced by hospital corners and gleaming glassware, neatly stacked away. Sherlock mourned the loss of his experiments and what seemed to be his favorite set of test tubes (Glass shards on the floor in a widespread pattern indicated they were thrown at high velocity. Anger? Possibly.) He felt every inch of road dirt worked into his hair and the particular griminess associated with with airports that felt alien in the flat’s newly sterilized environment. 

He proceeded to the kitchen. (No milk, John likely at Tesco.) His preferred chocolate biscuits that John found overly sweet were still hiding in the pantry. Fortified, he wandered to the downstairs bedroom. Here, finally, was where the cleaning tide had filed away his papers...in stacks...with no visible means of categorization. He tilted his head to the side, still better than the rest of it. A quick trip to the bathroom left him feeling less like he’d chased someone across Europe and parts of Asia. Returning to the front room, he smiled idly at his graffiti, touched his skull briefly, moved to remount the Cluedo board on the mantle, and caught his eye on a familiar shape.

Wedged beneath the couch cushions, his violin case, and his violin inside (beneath a few notes on means of strangulation using common household materials) were none the worse for wear for a bit of dust. 

Rosining the bow and tuning the strings felt like fitting himself back together. If he closed his eyes, he could pretend that he hadn’t seen the signs of John’s distress in every sparkling inch of the flat, that he hadn’t run himself ragged somewhere out there, and that they were still cavalier and impetuous and sure that no one could touch them. 

That he’d never stepped off that ledge.

Sherlock idly played with the high whistling notes of the wind from a rooftop (the one and only rooftop that mattered) and the minor key of Moriarty’s designs crept in. The flurried notes of pursuit soon followed and the bright points of each Watson amidst the despair of tracking a ghost. If the long, low strident notes of sadness hid beneath the rhythm of his race after Moran, no one would think to look there. Finally, the wind again and then the warm notes of home and tea and an exhausted anticipation. 

He lowered his bow and opened his eyes to see John.

John was sitting at the edge of his armchair, his hands running through his hair, and a forgotten bag of groceries at his feet. 

Sherlock waited, uncomfortably.

He shifted his weight and felt lost in his own skin.

John raised his eyebrow. 

He opened his mouth to speak. To say something. Anything.

John glared at him. He promptly shut his mouth and twisted the bow in his hand.

John visibly shuddered and finally (finally) spoke, “You were dead.” 

Sherlock opened his mouth to say, “Obviously not” and then probably something about the general idiocy of humanity. John glared at him again and Sherlock reconsidered.

“I begged you to not be dead.” John’s mouth trembled. Sherlock nodded tightly. He could be comforting. 

“You were there?” Sherlock may have misinterpreted John’s mood. He reluctantly nodded. 

The next thing he knew, he was lying on the floor, staring up at John with both hands clenched into fists at his sides and an ugly frown marring his face. This was a bad day. 

John turned on his heels and went into the kitchen.

Sherlock felt his jaw and the heat indicating the swelling that was already beginning. He considered his options and then followed John into the kitchen. Where else would he go?

\---

John was standing at the sink with both his hands on the counter top. There was a bag of ice on the counter next to him. Sherlock reached for it cautiously and held it to the already forming bruise.

“He had snipers. On Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade. On you, out in the middle of the street.”

John turned to study him as he spoke. 

“He said that if I didn’t jump, you were all dead. And then he shot himself.”

John flinched.

“We knew there was a network. He could never have pulled the heists or rigged the jury alone. I didn’t have Moriarty. Or any of his people. And I-” He nearly choked at the idea that Moran might have shot John  
anyway. That playing along was the best he could do.

John’s edges seemed to have softened. Still wary, but willing to listen at least, and as Sherlock began to cry in earnest, (In relief, it was done.) John reached out and embraced him.

Sherlock murmured “My dear Watson.” Then held tight when John tried to pull away and laughed softly at his confusion. “Out of all of them, my dearest Watson.” 

He could explain tomorrow. He had days, and years and possibly a retirement in beekeeping. He smiled fondly, as John gave up trying to figure him out. 

He was home.

\-----

Epilogue:

He never had explained the Watson network or mass hallucination to John.

He was regretting that now, as he caught sight of a familiar face in the crowd. Although, her identical look of surprise was satisfying. The man at her side was currently examining the streetlight carefully (Clever. The streetlight was where the murderer had waited for the victim. If you knew how to read the signs.) Wait...Sherlock blinked. 

Over his shoulder, he could hear John talking with the shopkeeper who knew the murdered banker. Without turning, he called, “John. We’re done. Another detective has this case.” Then walked away without pause, missing John’s gaping expression of disbelief. 

Sherlock tried very hard to delete the whole thing from his memory.

They were on the very next flight out of New York.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to reyndard_muldrak on livejournal for betaing. This is my first fic. Crossposted on livejournal.


End file.
